1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to data centers and, more particularly, to systems for monitoring and presenting information concerning the temperature in data centers.
2. Background Information
Organizations, such as companies, educational institutions, and others, often install numerous pieces of computing equipment in centralized locations known as data centers. A data center, which may be located in a building, typically includes a large number of information technology (IT) and/or computing equipment, such as servers, switches, routers, storage systems, etc. The equipment is often rack-mounted within server cabinets located in the data center. As a result of the dense packing of the IT equipment in the server cabinets and in the data center, significant heat is generated within the data center. To prevent premature failure of the IT equipment, which might otherwise occur due to the excessive heat generated within the data center, cooling equipment, such as computer room air conditioning units (CRACs), is often installed to cool the data center and the IT equipment located therein. Nonetheless, localized “hot” spots may occur in the data center due, e.g., to different IT equipment loadings in the server cabinets, different operating characteristics of the equipment, different placement of the server cabinets within the data center, air flow patterns, etc. Significant time and resources are spent by managers of data centers identifying such “hot” spots, and taking corrective action.